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Monday, 21 November 2011

In case you hadn't spotted it: tomorrow night at 7.30, TV3 is screening a programme about child poverty in New Zealand. It should be well worth watching, but I'm also very interested to see how it presents the parents of poor children, especially the mothers - given that sole parent households are the most likely to be living in poverty, and John Key's government is hell-bent on seeing mothers on benefits as nothing but failed jobseekers. Parent-blaming is (a) usually way off the mark and (b) does absolutely nothing to improve things for parents or children. I think it's a good idea to send in prompt feedback on programmes like this, to say what we think they've got right and what they've got wrong. Interstingly, in the leaders' debate on TV3 tonight, the "worm" shot way up whenever Phil Goff talked about poor children, inequality, low wages and struggling families.

Scoop's Lyndon Hood did a great satirical version of the famous David Low cartoon figure, Colonel Blimp. recently, featuring Blimp's views on welfare.

As I believe it was Bryan Bruce's personal project, so to speak, that would have been a bit silly. I mean, you could make a valid point that it's mainly 'older white men' who are in a position to make documentaries, but in this case, it was a good documentary that he obviously cared about.

There were more women in the parents/school workers section, but that would reflect the fact that in real life, most of those people would be women (as he seemed to be randomly knocking on doors, that's hardly his fault). There was a man who didn't want to be filmed, and he made a point of talking to the two dads in Sweden.

The experts were evenly divided.

So yes, while there were gender issues, I don't think the documentary created them or influenced them.

(Also, it was apparently the most watched video on TV3, and has just been released globablly)